Throughout my travels to clients and other events, I do a lot of facilitating for Helios HR and the number one question I am asked is, “How much does it cost? “ My answer is always the same…” it depends.” Training programs are offered in many forms, and there are several areas to consider when looking at the options for how much it will cost and the effectiveness.

HR is playing games with you! Believe it or not, in a growing trend, businesses are using gaming in a variety of human resources (HR) functions including hiring, leadership development, and employee recognition. Gamification is a combination of behavioral science and technology that provides companies with great tools for employee development, assessment of candidates, feedback, recognition, and collaboration.

Employee engagement surveys, sometimes called employee satisfaction surveys or employee feedback surveys, can be a great tool for leaders to understand employee viewpoints on a variety of organizational aspects. Before an organization launches an employee engagement survey it is important to understand the pros, cons, and things to keep in mind when seeking to determine a level of engagement by asking for your employee’s opinion.

Did you know there are five generations in today's modern workforce? Now, if we could just get everyone to all work together! Let's take a quick review of each generation and their traits before we delve into the common problems we see our clients face...

Finding the right leader for your organization can mean double digit profits or shutting your doors forever. While this is certainly an extreme example of what can happen, we all look for exceptional leaders that can lead our organizations to new and exceptional heights. During my time as a Business Partner for Helios HR, I have had the pleasure of working with both exceptional and mediocre leaders. Some of these exceptional leaders have embodied the following characteristics as described in Kouzes and Posner’s famous work “The Leadership Challenge”:

I have handled many employee relations issues in my time as an HR professional and over the years have said to myself on countless occasions, “gosh, if only the manager had managed the employee, we wouldn't be having these performance discussions right now.” I think, too often, great employees are promoted into manager positions because that seems like the next logical step in that individual’s career path.